Island-in-Waiting Read online

  There was a tap on the door and Martha, swathed in a quilted housecoat, put her head round it. “I heard you draw back the curtains. Like a cup of tea?”

  “I’d love one.” I slipped on my dressing-gown and followed her to the kitchen. “What a fabulous view! You must have painted it countless times!”

  “But never to my satisfaction. Landscape isn’t my strong suit, anyway.”

  “What do you teach?”

  “Life mostly. My colleague covers the rest of the field. He’s incredibly good, not only as an artist but in the way he can put it over, though it hurts me to say so!”

  “You don’t like him?”

  “Can’t stand him – no-one can! But don’t let’s waste time talking about him. We were wondering if you’d like to come to the little local church this morning? We alternate between it and the college chapel. It’s only about two hundred years old, but there are foundations of at least three ancient keeils in the graveyard, not to mention one of the famous Manx crosses which dates from about the sixth century.”

  Hugo had wandered in, his hair curling from the steam in the bathroom. “Martha tends to forget that the facts she’s dug up aren’t all common knowledge,” he remarked, sitting down beside me. “If, as I suspect, you’ve never heard of the ‘famous Manx crosses’, don’t be afraid to say so.”

  “Then I haven’t, nor of a – keeil, did you say? What’s that?”

  Martha refilled my cup. “A primitive Celtic church built by Irish missionaries in the fifth century or so. They were very small and usually had a tiny circular cell alongside for the priest. If you’re interested I can show you a good example at Lag-ny-Killey –”

  “Oh darling, hang on! Not before breakfast!”

  She flushed and laughed. “Sorry, I do tend to get carried away!”

  “I’d love to see your keeil, Martha,” I said staunchly. “In fact, I hope to explore the whole island while I’m here. How big is it?”

  “Roughly thirty miles by eleven, I think, at the widest point. Not large, but there’s plenty to see: prehistoric burial grounds, standing stones, hill forts, runic crosses – you name it, we’ve got it! Our idea of a perfect weekend is to set out with a picnic lunch and wander wherever the mood takes us. Then we spend the evening checking what we’ve seen against Martha’s reference books.”

  Hugo cooked the breakfast that morning, mounds of crisply fried bacon, mushrooms from the adjoining field and farm eggs. I who had existed in France on café filtre and the occasional brioche ate hungrily and enjoyed every mouthful. In the end we had to hurry to be in time for church.

  St Stephen’s was as interesting as Martha had promised. The walls were of slightly porous Manx stone and there was a gentle air of decay about the worn, almost illegible epitaphs of long-dead Manxmen. The little congregation sang lustily, the curate preached an interesting sermon, and afterwards, back in the warming sunshine, Martha led me round to inspect the Manx cross.

  “It depicts the legend of Sigurd and the dragon Fafni,” she explained. “There are several crosses dotted round the island with different scenes from the legend so that taken together they form a kind of stone story book. Admittedly the figures aren’t easy to decipher, but this is supposed to be Sigurd’s horse Grani – see? – and if you look carefully you can just make out the scales of the dragon down in that corner.”

  “It’s – incredible,” I said. I had a curious sensation of being drawn forward into the heart of the stone, and far from having difficulty in making out the representations carved on it, the details filled themselves in for me to such an extent that I could almost see the sweat on Grani’s flanks and the blood spurting from the heart of the dragon. “Isn’t that – a dwarf – down there on the left?” I murmured hesitantly. I had only just bitten back the name ‘Regin’ and waited, scarcely breathing, for Martha to confirm it.

  She bent forward excitedly, peering through her spectacles. “Do you know, I believe you’re right! However did you distinguish that? It must be Regin, waiting for the chance to betray Sigurd.”

  The stone blurred alarmingly and I put out a hand to steady myself, grateful for the reassuring grasp of Hugo’s hand. “All right, Chloe?”

  “Yes. Yes, thanks.” I wanted to run away but my legs wouldn’t have supported me, to escape from my uncanny knowledge of the ancient Norse legend which, as we turned to walk from the churchyard, Martha was painstakingly relating to me. And I knew it, I thought numbly, I knew it all. I who at breakfast this morning had admitted my ignorance of the very existence of Manx crosses had become in the space of a drawn breath an expert on at least one of them.

  The road down the hill was narrow and winding and it was necessary for Hugo to walk ahead of us. Beside me Martha’s voice rattled on, about the Jurby cross which showed Sigurd slaying the dragon, the Malew one of him roasting its heart, and that at Andreas, on which Gunnar was being bitten to death in the snakepit. And the names of Jurby and Malew and Andreas, which surely I had never heard before, were not only familiar to me but conjured up an awareness of their individual locations.

  We turned off the road at last into the lane leading to the cottage and the strangeness that had held me began to ebb away. Later, I resolved, I would tell Hugo and Martha about it, but first I needed to come to terms with it myself. I was not yet prepared to risk another breath-freezing plunge into the dark folklore of Scandinavia, and throughout lunch I chatted determinedly about my months in France.

  “I’m delighted it turned out so well,” Hugo remarked complacently. “So when you leave here you’re off to try your luck in the Big City? Hard on the parents; they’ve scarcely seen you during the last two years.”

  “I don’t think they’ll shed any tears,” I replied lightly, and, at his raised eyebrows, went on quickly, “Oh Hugo, you know as well as I do that I’m an embarrassment to them! Once they realized I wasn’t going to amount to anything they opted out. Or rather,” I corrected myself with a small laugh, “they simply didn’t opt in! They’d no interest in us as young children,” I explained to Martha. “Esmé escaped at the earliest opportunity and left us to a string of nannies. I always felt I missed out on something and built up a positive barrage of inhibitions. It didn’t affect Hugo, though. He slipped neatly into gear and fulfilled all their expectations and they were able to sit back complacently and applaud from the sidelines.”

  Hugo said quietly, “I appreciate they were hardly doting parents, but I’d no idea you felt so strongly about it. Is that why you went to France?”

  “Partly. Esmé obviously took my lack of achievement as a personal insult and I had the distinct impression that I was bad for business!” I glanced at him, noting his frown. “Don’t look so worried, brother dear, I’m used to it now. All I was trying to say was that if I go to London there will be nothing but relief all round. I’m welcome at Oxford as a visitor, but that’s all.”

  Martha put her hand over mine. “You’re welcome here, anyway, for as long as you’d like to stay.”

  “That’s sweet of you. Tell you what: you show me round the island and in return – if you’d like me to – I’ll give you some tips on cooking.”

  “Will you?” Martha’s face lit up. “It’s a deal!” She turned to Hugo. “Beloved, all is not lost!”

  “Unfortunately,” he answered with a smile, “cooking requires a certain amount of concentration, and if your head is stuffed full of ship burials or you’re worrying about the light fading before you’ve finished your canvas, the odds are you’ll still end up with disintegrated potatoes, however well Chloe instructs you!”

  “See the faith he has in me!” Martha said ruefully. “Still, I’m an eternal optimist and if I can just watch you preparing meals-if you wouldn’t mind, that is – I’m sure I’ll learn a lot.”

  Hugo threw back his head and laughed. “Chloe, my sweet, that is my wife’s way of informing you that you may take over the cuisine for as long as you’re here!”

  “Oh – I didn’t mean �
�” Martha stammered.

  “But I wouldn’t mind, honestly. In fact it would ease my conscience over perhaps stretching my visit from one week to two, if that would be all right?”

  “You heard what Martha said. We’ll be delighted to have you for as long as you want to stay.”

  After the meal, Hugo went out to the garden and Martha and I cleared the table. I was wondering with a touch of bewilderment why, entirely without previous thought, I had asked to extend my visit. In view of my experience in St Stephen’s churchyard the more sensible course would surely have been to curtail it.

  It was as Martha dried the last plate and I was rinsing round the bowl that she exclaimed suddenly, “Oh no! Not that!”

  “What is it?” I straightened and followed her glance out of the window. A man was leaning on the gate talking to Hugo, and once again the safe, warm present fragmented like a shaken kaleidoscope and reformed to show a symbolic black cloud hanging over the stranger’s head. As I blinked incredulously he turned towards the house and in the same instant a needling pain zigzagged like a current through my head. I caught my breath as Martha said disgustedly, “That’s all we need! The surest way to ruin a Sunday afternoon!”

  “Who is it?” I asked carefully.

  “Ray Kittering, the art master I was telling you about. Oh blast! Hugo’s sure to ask him in for a cup of tea.”

  “Why don’t you like him?” I was conscious of a curious empathy with the dark-haired man at the gate, a feeling as totally without reason as my cognizance in the churchyard earlier.

  “It would take too long to go into,” Martha answered curtly. “There! What did I tell you?”

  Presumably at Hugo’s invitation, Ray Kittering had pushed open the gate and they were both walking towards the house. Martha opened the back door. “Hello, Ray. We saw you from the window.”

  “Good afternoon.” His eyes, large and dark, moved to me and the odd little current, less painful this time, shot through me again. I couldn’t put a name to it; it was nothing as commonplace as physical attraction.

  “Chloe, this is Ray Kittering from St Olaf’s,” Hugo was saying. “My sister, Ray.”

  He held out his hand and, still confused by my reactions, I took it rather hesitantly. “I hear this is your first visit? I’d be glad to show you round the island some time.” His voice was soft, with an Irish intonation offset against a hint of the north country. I found it curiously attractive. Hugo took him through to the sitting-room and Martha said quietly,

  “I shouldn’t fall for that line. You don’t want to be tied to the like of him while you’re here.”

  “Surely he’s not that bad?” I said defensively. “I got the impression he’s rather unsure of himself.”

  She regarded me with open amazement. “Whatever gave you that idea? He’s about as unsure of himself as a boa-constrictor!”

  I flashed a curious glance at our guest as I carried through the tray. There was nothing in his appearance to excite such antipathy. He was slightly built, of medium height, with dark hair shaggy over his ears, a thin nose and a mouth that looked as though it could be petulant. Without doubt his eyes were his best feature, dark and slumbrous with thick sweeping lashes.

  “One without milk,” I said quickly as Martha started to pour.

  “Thanks, I was forgetting.” She looked up. “For Ray, you mean? How did you know that?”

  I stared back at her, pulses suddenly racing, aware that I was the focus of everyone’s interested attention. “I’ve – no idea!” I faltered.

  “I was just about to remind her myself,” Ray said slowly. “Have you the sight, Chloe Winter, or was it the little people whispering in your ear?”

  With a smilingly incoherent disclaimer I handed him his tea but his eyes followed me as I moved away and sat down.

  “Well, I’ve a touch of it myself, and there’s something I know for sure. You’ll be over here for a long time yet, I’d take a bet on it.”

  “Then I’m afraid you’d lose it,” I said breathlessly. “I’m only on holiday, two weeks at the most.”

  He shook his head decidedly. “I feel it in my bones and I’m never mistaken. You belong here, somehow. You should have come years ago.”

  Catching Martha’s frown I hastily picked up my teacup. Hugo was saying something about St Olaf’s but I scarcely heard him. Of their own volition my eyes returned to Ray Kittering and encountered his steady gaze. A strange excitement began to flow over me, and the physical attraction I’d discounted suddenly asserted itself, drying my mouth and setting my heart pounding. Dimly I was aware that our concentration on each other was causing Hugo and Martha some embarrassment but I was as powerless to break away as a hypnotized rabbit. And as the phrase came into my mind a nerve jerked agonizingly and at last I was able to drop my eyes.

  Immediately Ray broke into the conversation. “When can I see you?” It was blunt to the point of rudeness, completely excluding the others in the room.

  “I don’t know.”

  His excitement, only partly physical, was coming across in great scarlet waves of emotion. “Tonight?”

  “I’m sorry,” Hugo put in smoothly, making a stand at last. “We have other plans for this evening.”

  “I’ll phone you, then.” Ignoring Hugo, he spoke directly to me but Martha, roused by Hugo’s intervention, came to his assistance.

  “To what do we owe the pleasure of this visit anyway?” she asked acidly.

  His concentrated attention shifted at last and I felt myself go limp, as though strings which had been manipulating me had suddenly slackened.

  “You asked for the set of folios I’d collected. I put them on the hall table.”

  “Thank you.”

  There was a brief, splintered silence and Ray, finally interpreting the atmosphere in the room, rose to his feet. Without a word Martha preceded him to the door and held it open.

  “I’ll be in touch,” he said, and was gone. Hugo, with an expressive glance at his wife, followed him.

  “What happened, Chloe?” Martha was regarding me with a puzzled frown. “You just seemed to – go under.”

  That was it, exactly. Under – submerged – incapable of thought or breath. “He’s very attractive,” I said unsteadily.

  “So I’ve been told, though I can’t see it myself. Everyone at college loathes him. You asked me why earlier. For one thing, he goes out of his way to upset people, but it’s more than that. Sometimes in the Common Room he sits watching me, smiling slightly, and I get the creepy feeling that he knows exactly what I’m thinking.” She shuddered. “Not to put too fine a point on it, he frightens me. I know it sounds crazy, but there it is.”

  Hugo came back into the room. “Well, he certainly gave you the full treatment, didn’t he? I’ve never seen him in action before. Take my advice and give him a wide berth, my girl. You’re supposed to be here to enjoy yourself and I don’t want to have to pick up any broken pieces.”

  “Why couldn’t I see him tonight?”

  Hugo eyed me speculatively. “Because we’re going out for drinks.”

  “Are we?” Martha looked surprised.

  “As of now, yes. A few of the crowd congregate at the King Orry on Sunday evenings. There’s no reason why on this occasion we shouldn’t join them.”

  “In other words it was just an excuse.” I stared at him sullenly, resenting his intervention.

  “It was,” he confirmed blandly, “and a much needed one, I felt.”

  “To protect me from Ray Kittering?” My voice was heavy with sarcasm.

  “To protect you from yourself,” Hugo answered sombrely. “Now stop being awkward, there’s a good girl. I’ve no intention of standing by while Ray devours you, so you might as well accept the fact.”

  I regained my equilibrium during the afternoon and after a light supper we duly set out for the King Orry, an attractive little inn outside Ballaugh. The oak-beamed room, dominated by a brass-canopied chimney-piece, was filled to capacity. Hugo guid
ed Martha and myself over to the far corner, where a group of people were talking animatedly. They turned to welcome us and the blood suddenly rushed to my face in a wave of excitement. Two feet away from me was the man I had so nearly run to greet in the departure lounge at Heathrow.

  Hugo, totally oblivious of my confusion, introduced him in turn. “Neil Sheppard, my sister Chloe.”

  He held out his hand. “Didn’t we come over on the same plane yesterday?”

  “Yes, I believe so.” It was as useless to pretend I didn’t remember him as to deny the deep sense of familiarity which once more flooded over me. Even his voice was well known to me, and the way his mouth lifted slightly at one corner when he smiled –

  Mechanically I responded to the other names Hugo was reeling off – Pam Beecham, Martin and Sheila Shoesmith, John Stevens, Simon and Carol Fenton.

  “Are you over here for long?” Neil asked, handing me a glass. I felt Pam Beecham glance at me quickly.

  “About two weeks, I think. I haven’t seen Hugo and Martha for some time.”

  “You were wise to wait till the season was over. Provided the weather holds, the island is at its best at this time of the year. Didn’t Hugo say you’ve been in France?”

  “Yes, for almost two years.”

  “Doing cookery, wasn’t it?” put in Carol Fenton. “We’ll have to persuade you to pass on a few tips while you’re here!”

  “Will you be going back to France?” Pam enquired.

  “I don’t think so, but I haven’t any definite plans yet.” Jean-Claude wanted me to return for Christmas. If I did, I knew it would be taken as a sign that our interest in each other was serious.

  “Neil, I meant to tell you:” Pam tucked her arm possessively in his. “I was able to get an extra ticket after all, if you’d like to come.”